The Reading-based natural gas utility announced the new jobs this afternoon in a news release. The jobs requiring highly skilled workers and the recruitment process has already begun, the release says.

The infrastructure project is a multiyear initiative to replace cast-iron and bare-steel pipelines with modern material.

A cast-iron main installed in 1928 beneath Allen Street cracked, causing the Feb. 9, 2011, explosion in the 500 block of North 13th Street in Allentown. The explosion leveled a block and killed five people.

After a 16-month investigation into the blast, the Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission found that a UGI work order from December 1979 recommended the pipe for a replacement that never happened.

UGI paid a $500,000 fine, the maximum penalty allowed by law, and agreed to accelerate its program for replacing old pipelines in its system, which spans 45 counties in Pennsylvania, including Lehigh and Northampton counties.

The infrastructure project is expected to take several years to complete, according to the utility’s news release. The associated jobs will be based throughout the utility’s service area.

“UGI’s human resources and operations departments are working with trade and technical schools within our service territory, and also are participating in excellent programs like Helmets to Hardhats to identify and recruit good candidates for UGI’s field staff,” UGI Utilities CEO and President Robert F. Beard said in a statement.

Those hired will go through extensive training at UGI to meet not only company requirements, but those of regulatory agencies such as the U.S. Department of Transportation and Occupational Safety and Health Administration, the news release says.

Beard said that in addition to the 100 plus field jobs, UGI also plans to add supervisory, management and training positions.